Re: OPO: How to get form to be "active"...

> Apparently this may be standard Macintosh behaviour. I showed it to
> a Mac user (eg simply showed him the behaviour first, and then my
> complaint after) and he said "So?".
>
> In other words... Even though a form/dialog is opened by an application
> for user input, it is not unusual that the form first needs to be
> clicked on before it accepts keyboard input.
>
> IMO, it's repugnant that the GUI gives all the visual clues as being
> ready to accept input, but doesn't.

Nope, not standard Mac behavior at all. Check out the Macintosh Human Interface Guidelines for more info. There are times when there is no selected field, and you must click in one to be able to enter text - Netscape for example. It's unusual though, and not standard.

The OPO behavior is a bug, nothing more. Perhaps you can make the window NOT look ready, so a click is more evidently needed. Or as I said in my last post, use a menu item instead of a button to open the window.

Michael Kranzdorf                                    mikek_at_krt.com
Kranzco Realty Trust       http://www.krt.com         610.941.9292